Forever His (17 page)

She couldn’t understand why he had kissed her. But now that she was alone and clearheaded and could think rationally, she had to admit one inescapable fact: she had developed some kind of intense ... attraction to her maddening husband. That wasn’t even the right word. A connection? A bond? She didn’t
have
a word to describe what she was feeling.

Maybe it was simply because he was so damn
male
. She was used to the twentieth-century variety of the species—most of them polite and well-behaved and occasionally even sensitive. Gaston was none of those things. He was blunt and commanding and relentless in pursuing what he wanted. An unrepentant scoundrel who loved hunting, fighting, women, and a good strong drink. Not necessarily in that order.

One-hundred-percent virile, unrefined male.

Even as the sensible part of her found those qualities primitive and alarming, some other, deeper part of her was responding to them. To
him
. In a way she had never experienced before. Something about Gaston brought all of her senses alive—and engaged every emotion she had, from outrage to concern to desire to ...

She stopped herself before she could name any other feelings she might be developing for him. All she knew was that from the moment she had met Gaston, she had felt more ...
alive
than she had in a very long time.

And after that kiss two days ago, if he hadn’t shouted at her to leave, if he had instead taken that single step toward her and swept her into his arms again, she wouldn’t have objected.

She would have given in
.

To his kiss—and more.

He had sworn he wouldn’t consummate their vows, but he had never made any promises about kissing. Or anything else. Exactly how far might he go before it was considered consummation?

Celine sat up suddenly, getting out of bed. Tossing the blankets aside, she sent her kitten tumbling into the rushes.

“Oops, I’m sorry, Groucho.” She scooped him up and settled him back in his favorite spot. “I haven’t exactly been the best company these past couple of days, have I?” She scratched the bridge of his nose, but he would have none of it. With a lion-size yawn, he hopped across the covers, down the side of the bed, and rustled through the rushes until he reached the hearth.

Celine sighed, trying to calm her jangled nerves as she watched him. Little Groucho had been her only companion since she had been shut in her room. Yolande had brought him up from the great hall that first day, just after Royce had posted himself outside the door.

The odd thing was, Yolande had said it was Gaston who had ordered Celine’s pet brought to her room.

Another unexpected act of kindness.

Shaking her head, she went to the small table in the corner and poured herself a cup of water. Couldn’t the man be even a
little
predictable? Just when she was convinced that he was completely unfeeling and impossible, he had to go and do something thoughtful.

Little wonder that she was feeling so confused and off-balance. And exhausted. What she needed, desperately, was a good night’s sleep. She climbed back into bed and huddled under the covers.

She also needed to start thinking rationally here. To keep
one
essential fact in mind: Gaston was a womanizing cad. The sort who could tumble tavern wenches, then brag about it publicly. If she were looking for a playboy or a one-night-stand kind of guy, there were plenty of them back in the twentieth century.

The worst part was, she sensed he had boasted about his conquest only to hurt her.

And it worked.

Every time she thought of him in bed with the tavern girl—Celine pictured a toothy blonde with a buxom figure and a mug of ale in each hand—she felt a sharp ache, right in the pit of her stomach. To imagine him weaving that masterful sensual spell over another woman, kissing someone else the way he had kissed her, using his mouth and body and hands, making love ...

She cut the image off abruptly. It was making her nauseous. And her eyes were getting strangely misty.

She blinked hard. What did it matter to her? She had to leave. The sooner the better. He wasn’t important to her, she wasn’t important to him, and this marriage was nothing but a burden to both of them. Let him do all the “wenching” he wanted. It didn’t matter. And she wasn’t going to waste one more brain cell thinking about it. She had already wasted two whole days.

She
should
be focusing on how to get home. Her annoying husband was making good on his promise to have nothing more to do with her, and that was just fine by her. Perfect, in fact.

First thing in the morning, she was going to start doing a little detective work. She would need to find a way to distract Royce for ten minutes or so—just long enough to sneak out of here and into the bedchamber down the hall for a closer look at her “window of opportunity.” She wanted to see if there was anything unusual about it.

She pulled the blankets closer, pleased that she was finally getting her plans—and her emotions—back on track.

She was leaving.

It didn’t matter to her what Gaston did.

She didn’t care about him.

Or whom he slept with.

And that
was not
a tear gliding down her cheek.

***

The room was still dark when she opened her eyes sometime later, feeling sleepy and disoriented, wondering what had awakened her. Then she felt a tug on the bedclothes.

“Lady Celine, wake up,” a small voice whispered.

Celine rolled over, startled. A child stood beside the bed, her eyes glittering unnaturally blue in the dim glow of the hearth’s embers. “Fiara?” Celine whispered, squinting in the low light. “How did you get in here?”

“You must hurry, Lady Celine.” The little girl glanced toward the hearth. “Aye, Groucho, greetings to you as well. I am pleased you have been such good company to your mistress.”

Celine’s grogginess dissipated as she tried to follow the dual conversation. “What do you mean, hurry? How did you get past Royce? Hurry
where?
”

“I am going home,” Fiara said adamantly. For all her mysticism and seriousness, she suddenly sounded very much like the lonely little girl she was. “
Maman
thought I would be happy here, but I am not. If you would still like to see her, I will take you with me.”

“Your mother?” Celine sat bolt upright, her heart doubling its pace. “But I thought you said—”

“She will not be happy that I disobeyed her, but I will not stay here one more day.” Fiara’s voice quavered and Celine heard a telltale sniff. The child rubbed at her eyes with one small fist. “Please do not worry about Captain Royce. He will not be a problem. But if you would like to come with me, I think you should dress first.”

Celine didn’t need any more urging than that. She was on her feet, dressed, and grabbing her cloak in two minutes flat. Gaston would be furious when he found her missing. He was suspicious and mistrustful of her as it was, and this little disappearing act was not going to improve matters. In fact, she thought with foreboding, his reaction would probably make his mood the other day look downright gleeful by comparison.

But Fiara’s mother might be the only person around who could tell her what she needed to know to get
home
. She couldn’t miss this chance to meet the woman, no matter what the risks.

As soon as Celine was ready, Fiara turned and opened the door, not being at all cautious.

“Fiara, wait. Don’t you think we should—”

The little girl stepped into the corridor without hesitation. Celine froze, certain her escape was about to end before it had even begun.

But she didn’t hear a word from Royce. After a moment, she followed Fiara—and found her guard sitting beside the door, asleep.

“Well, some great guard he turned out to be,” Celine muttered in surprise. “Asleep on the job.”

“He will not waken until morning.”

Celine glanced at Fiara and back at Royce, realizing only then that his position looked a little odd: his legs stretched straight out in front of him, his arms limp at his sides. It didn’t appear he had settled in for a nap—more like he had been standing upright and slid down the wall.

Celine knelt beside him with a little gasp of alarm. “Oh, Fiara, you didn’t
do
anything to him, did you?”

“I did not hurt him,” Fiara said indignantly. “I merely looked into his eyes for a few moments and suggested he sleep until morning.”

“You
hypnotized
him?” Celine hesitantly tapped Royce’s shoulder, but he didn’t stir. He appeared unharmed, but he was lost to the world.

“He made a most challenging subject. For some reason, he is a very suspicious person.”

Celine turned an uncertain gaze on her small companion. This sweet-faced ten-year-old had a surprising array of tricks up her sleeve. It wasn’t difficult to understand why she frightened people, especially the other children. Celine was more than a little unnerved herself. “Fiara, I’m not so sure—”

“Milady, we must go. There has been no snow for almost five days, so the roads will be more passable, but it will still require several hours to make our way to the village afoot.”

Celine knew she couldn’t afford to hesitate, but the dangers involved here were starting to sink in. The two of them would be going beyond the safety of the castle gates, alone—and she had no idea what might be waiting out there in the medieval gloom. “Are you sure it’s smart of us to go off through the woods at night, on foot? And unarmed? I mean, aren’t there wolves and who knows what else prowling around?”

“They will not be a problem,” Fiara said confidently. She turned to lead the way down the corridor.

Somehow, that was exactly the answer Celine had expected.

She stood up, resolutely forcing aside thoughts of wolves and cutthroats and other risks ... such as facing Gaston when she got back. When it came right down to it, she had no choice about this. She would just have to deal with the consequences later.

With one last, worried look at Royce, she followed her diminutive guide.

***

Walking through a medieval forest after midnight, Celine could easily see where tales of spooks and Halloween and werewolves and headless horsemen had gotten their start.

The winter wind sliced through her fur-lined garments, numbed her feet, made a white mist of her breath—which she could barely see in the pale thread of light from the night’s half-moon. Darkness and threat seemed to emanate from all sides, even from the bare tree branches that clattered overhead like bony fingers. The moon’s tentative glow barely penetrated the black woods, shimmering on the snow. She could just make out Fiara’s small shape trudging forward down the trampled path.

Deep drifts blanketed the edges of the uneven road, which hardly lived up to the term. A superhighway it was not. Celine tripped on deep ruts and killer potholes more than once. In some spots the trail opened wide and straight, but in others it twisted and narrowed so tightly she doubted a horse and rider could squeeze through—though apparently several had. The snow was covered with hoofprints. And footprints and wheel marks.

And paw prints. Big, canine-looking paw prints.

Several times they heard a wolf howl, and the eerie sound sent an icy shaft of primitive fear through Celine. She couldn’t tell how far away the hungry-sounding beasts were, but once she thought she saw a pair of huge shadows moving through the trees beside them. Fiara appeared unconcerned.

It wasn’t until the first rays of morning light had brightened the uppermost branches that they came in sight of their destination. Exhausted, the muscles in her legs tingling with fatigue, Celine breathed a heavy sigh of relief. The small hut, nestled in a clearing, looked as welcoming as the posh Plaza Hotel in New York. There were no other huts to be seen, but curls of smoke rising above the trees showed that the village was only a short distance away.

The humble little home had the same construction as the outbuildings at the castle: walls made of mud and sticks and a thatched roof. The straw had a few bare patches, though. A lone chicken strutted about the yard.

A woman came to the door with a startled look on her face, even before Fiara had broken into a run.

“Maman!”
the little girl cried.
“Maman, maman!”

The woman’s look of surprise dissolved in a burst of tears. She fell to her knees to sweep her daughter into her arms.

When Celine caught up with them, the woman gazed up at her openmouthed. “By all the holy gods,” she whispered, straightening with Fiara still clasped in her arms. She was in her late twenties, as beautiful as her daughter, with the same golden hair—and the same laser-blue eyes. “Y-you are ... you are—”

“A moon-lady!” Fiara chirped happily. “Oh,
maman
, I am so glad to be home. I could not stay with Aunt Marithe. No one liked me, and I was so unhappy, and I do not care if we have little to eat, if only I can stay here with you!”

The woman stroked her daughter’s hair, but her wide eyes were still on Celine. “From ... from when have you come?”

The bizarre question sounded completely rational at the moment. “From seven hundred years in the future.” Celine swallowed hard, weary and hopeful and above all relieved that she was finally speaking the truth to someone who believed it. “From 1993. My name is Celine Fontaine. I guess I don’t have to explain to you how I got here?”

The woman shook her head, but kept staring as if she could not quite believe her eyes. Then she abruptly turned her attention back to her child. “Oh, my sweet, reckless Fiara! You must be more careful, daughter. If you were to reveal too much to the wrong person—”

“I was careful,
maman
. I always am. Lady Celine is unhappy, and she wants very badly to go home ... and I know so well how she feels. I had to help her.”

Celine smiled at Fiara, touched by the depth of empathy in such a young child. “And I am
very
grateful, Fiara, that you brought me here to speak to your mother.”

“Aye, come, we must speak.” The woman cast a sudden, nervous look around the clearing. “But inside.”